


Toil and Trouble

by ishtarelisheba



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Ish promptathon, two Rumples
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-21
Updated: 2017-03-21
Packaged: 2018-10-08 18:34:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10393500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ishtarelisheba/pseuds/ishtarelisheba
Summary: When Emma and Regina return from the wish realm, it turns out they have an unexpected hanger-on. (AU in which it wasn't wish!Robin who followed them through the wardrobe portal.)





	

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt - _Anonymous said: Wish verse Rumple following Emma and Regina back to SB instead of RH._

There was the expected whirl of magic, then darkness. After a moment, something exploded outward and he was in the light again - the wrong light. It smelled wrong, as well. 

Rumpelstiltskin climbed through the hole in the tree, not quite knowing what to expect. He stepped out into rotting leaves and air that smelled and tasted used. 

“No!” he heard the princess yell at him. Now dressed strangely, she stalked back toward him, brazenly wagging a finger. “No, you did _not_ follow us through! You go back!”

“It doesn’t work that way…” The Evil Queen reached for the princess’ arm, pulling her back a step. “He can’t just go through again. It’s a one-way ticket.”

“Great. Just wonderful. That’s all we need. Another Gold.” The princess gave him a suspicious look. “We can’t just let him wander around town.”

“No, we can’t.” The queen eyed him.

“What are we gonna do? Lock him up at the sheriff’s office? Somehow I don’t see that working.”

“We need to get back to everyone. Your family will be worried.”

Princess Emma looked sidelong at the queen. “We could take him to Belle and Gold. Let them sort it out.”

“Now that’s an idea,” the queen said with an unsettling smile.

“Belle?” he perked up at the name. “What do you mean, ‘Belle’? Belle is dead. _She-”_ he stabbed a claw in the Evil Queen’s direction, “allowed Belle to starve in a tower!”

“For the last time, I am not _that_ Regina. Look, yes, Belle is here. Alive and well, and we’re going to take you to her.”

“Yeah, how about that?” the princess said, clearly attempting to cajole him. “We’ll go see Belle.”

“Do you truly think I’m going to follow you?” he asked, raising an eyebrow at the way they spoke about him like some _thing_ to simply take along and drop off at will.

“You don’t have to follow us, but we’re gonna make sure you get to them. Okay?” Princess Emma coaxed.

He considered. If Belle - _a_ Belle was in truth alive in this world, could some duplicate of Baelfire be, also? He’d easily found his son’s grave in the royal tombs. It had been the last in the row - the most recently commissioned monument, beautiful and fitting as a memorial for his boy. But if his Bae was here in some form… 

“All right,” he agreed. “I’ll go with you. But not because you demand it.”

“Of course not.” The queen rolled her eyes as she turned. “Come on.”

He walked a few paces away from the two women as they made their way through the forest and onto a road. The horseless carriages that passed them on the way into this village they apparently headed toward didn’t faze him. Nor did the fashions. He’d seen plenty of odd clothing in his travels between realms. The startled looks he received as they walked pleased him. His reputation was not lost.

It wasn’t until the queen opened a shop door to wave him inside after Princess Emma that he was brought up short. A couple stood behind a glass counter on the far end of the shop, talking quickly and worriedly about something. With her hair up so and her back to him, thirty years falling away, it took him a half second to recognize-

“Belle?” he breathed, coming to a stop so sudden that he had to use a touch of magic to keep himself from stumbling.

She turned, and he could see the shock in her expression. She should be angry with him. _Furious._ She should hate him. He had to remind himself that this wasn’t truly his Belle, and the thought hurt all over again.

He shifted a look to the man she was with, prepared to be jealous and resentful, and he found himself looking at...himself.

“What is this?” Belle asked.

“Who is _that?”_ Rumpelstiltskin demanded, pointing at the man who frowned at him from next to her.

 _“That_ would be Rumpelstiltskin,” the man in the suit declared, one of his eyebrows raising.

“I have some doubt about that!” He lifted a hand, allowing a fireball to gather in his palm.

“All right, now,” the queen called, slamming the door.

Princess Emma stepped past him, into the middle of the shop. “We can explain.”

“Then please do. Quickly,” the man next to Belle said between grit teeth.

The queen and princess spent the next few minutes describing their adventures in what they called ‘the wish realm’ while Rumpelstiltskin spent the time going back and forth between glaring at himself and gazing at Belle.

“So, he isn’t real?” Belle said, though the look on her face seemed doubtful. “Because I’m telling you, he looks very real.”

“I…” Princess Emma turned to look at him, almost cringing. “I’m not exactly sure. I mean, it was a _wish_ realm? I think he only exists because of a wish.”

“I _am_ growing a bit weary of being declared a ‘not real,’” he announced. He spun on his heel, giving a grand gesture down the length of his body before bowing deeply in Belle’s direction. “I guarantee you, I am right here.”

He looked up at her from beneath his brow, not at all missing the smile that she pressed between her lips.

The other Rumpelstiltskin cleared his throat. “I assure you, a thing coming into existence as the result of a wish makes it no less real.”

A strangely guilty expression crossed the queen’s face with the remark.

“Look, you know everything we do at this point,” the princess said. “I need to go see Henry and my parents. You guys can take care of him, right?”

“Of course,” Belle said, coming from around the counter. 

Her companion reached for her with a whisper of, “Belle!” but she’d stepped away too quickly.

The queen hesitated even after Princess Emma darted out of the shop. She looked between the three of them before shaking her head and shrugging. “Yeah, good luck.”

With that, they were alone. Belle approached him fearlessly - he’d have expected no less. She stood before him for a moment before reaching up to touch his face. He wasn’t certain why he flinched, but he didn’t seem to be in control of it.

“Hey,” she said softly, smiling right at him. 

His mouth twitched toward a smile of his own without much input from him. Gods, how he’d missed those blue eyes.

“Belle, careful,” the other Rumpelstiltskin said as he walked around to stand behind her. “We don’t know what condition he might be in. You heard what Emma said about where he’s been, how long he’s been imprisoned.”

He watched as Belle looked up at this man with the same affection in her eyes as they’d held when she looked at him so many years ago. While he knew intellectually that this was not his Belle, that his Belle was a pile of dusty bones in an entirely different world, his heart refused to listen. She was right in front of him, alive and well.

“I heard, yes,” she said before looking to him again. “We have to look after him, though.”

He sneered a bit at both of them. “I am not a stray animal.”

“That isn’t what I mean and you know it,” she told him with a scolding look.

“We’ll look into sending him back where he came from,” the other man said. “He has a life there, Belle, certainly.”

“Where is Baelfire?” he interrupted when he could bear it no longer. Try as he might, he couldn’t keep the hope from his voice. “Is he- where is he?”

Belle and the other Rumpelstiltskin looked quickly at one another. There was sadness and pity in her eyes when they shifted back to him, and the other man’s gaze, filled with grief, dropped to the floor.

His heart sank.


End file.
